Mount Athos

Understand the geography and the visit makes sense. The monastic republic occupies the southern two thirds of the finger, sealed behind a land border that has held for a thousand years; the northern third is ordinary, welcoming Greece. Ouranoupoli, the last town before the border, is where the pilgrim boats and the cruise boats both leave, a place of one Byzantine tower, a working waterfront and tavernas that have watched a very unusual neighbour for centuries.

The cruise is the heart of the day for most visitors. Boats run along the west coast of the peninsula, holding the required distance offshore, while the monasteries slide past one after another: Docheiariou and Xenophontos near the water, Simonopetra impossibly stacked on its cliff like something grown from the rock. You do not need a permit on the water, everyone can come, and the commentary fills in a thousand years as the Holy Mountain itself, over two thousand metres of it, rises behind the domes.

Male visitors who wish to go further can enter on foot with a diamonitirion, the permit issued to a small daily quota of pilgrims and arranged well in advance. It is a pilgrimage rather than a tour: simple guest quarters in the monasteries, services before dawn, and a silence that visitors describe for the rest of their lives. We can advise on the process and the timing if this is the journey you are considering.

Then give the rest of the finger the day it deserves. The ferry from Tripiti crosses to Ammouliani in twenty minutes, Chalkidiki's only inhabited island, all soft beaches and slow lunches. Ierissos keeps a long quiet beach on the east coast, and the drive up through Gomati and the inland villages shows a Chalkidiki that tourism barely touches. Paired with the cruise, it makes one of the finest days out in northern Greece.